Jo Clayton: Fire in the Sky

“Mmm. that will take some arranging. They are difficult to control without danger of injury.” He twisted his mobile face into a clown’s grimace. “There is no dealing with them except by sign, which they ignore when they feel like it. Are you sure you want this?”

“Yes. Flakes, however fine, cannot substitute for actual experience. What I could learn would greatly help with tomorrow’s contact.”

He glanced at Shadith for the first time, raised his eyes to the ceiling in a fine imitation of thought, then nodded. “I’ll see to it.” He went back behind the desk and reached under the edge for a sensor. “In two hours. That should give you plenty of time before we feed them.” He nodded to the young Yarak who came in, stood beside the door. “The phora Galeyn here will take you to your quarters and fetch you again when the visit has been arranged. How many?”

“Myself and the harpist.”

“T’t’t’.” He came back around the desk, took Aslan’s hand, and helped her from the chair. He had a slight musky smell that was pleasant if a little strange and he was half a meter taller than she was, his physical presence intimidating despite his pleasant demeanor. Aslan lifted her head and fixed her eyes on him, waiting for him to step back into more comfortable range. Again Shadith swallowed a grin. By the time she’d made rank, a University Scholar had faced far more intimidating individuals than Goлs Koraka would ever be.

The fenced and patrolled enclosure beside the tower where young locals were being kept was filled with the pounding of feet, the slap of flesh against flesh from the energetic play, shouts, shrill screams, and snatches of song. Despite the amount of noise, there were only six of them, two Cousins and four Others.

One of the Cousins was a skinny red-haired boy with pale skin and a noseful of freckles, ten or eleven years old; the second was smaller, slighter, a dark-haired child a year or two younger; both wore dark brown shorts and white sleeveless shirts. The Others were all shorter and stockier than the redhead, bipeds with five-fingered hands and four toes on the feet. Their faces were triangular with the chin as vertex and the straight line of the moss across the brow as base. Their eyes were large and dark, shades of brown mostly, though one had lighter eyes than the others, amber, almost yellow. Their noses were hardly raised from the curved plane of the face, thin as knifeblades with long, fringed nostrils. Their mouths were wide, flexible, and produced an astonishing volume of sound.

A mossy growth more vegetable than fur covered torso and limbs out to the elbows and knees. Beyond that the skin was smooth, a pale greenish white like the inner layer of new bark. The moss also grew on the small round heads, much like hair, though it also resembled the plush fur of the Yaraka. There were buds among the head moss and here and there a small flower, narrow, arcing petals laid close to the curve of the head. The flowers were mostly white though Shadith could see one or two pink blooms and a bright yellow one.

They rushed the gate when they saw Aslan and Shadith coming, speech turning into whistles that seemed to be a combination of mutual support and preparation for attack. Shadith’s head started hurting as the Translator she’d acquired from Aleytys began sorting through the noises.

The phora Galeyn waved at the guards, then turned to face his charges. “If you’ll wait here, despines, we’ll clear the children from the gateway first. They always rush us, trying to get away.”

Shadith knelt, began undoing the catches on the harpcase. She glanced up to see the guards using tinglers, shuddered as she felt the waves of pain coming from the moss-children. They fled across the field, huddling near the far fence, but two of the guards kept tinglers turned on them as the third manipulated the gate lock.

She collapsed the memory plast of the case into a stool, then, pale with the pain from the Translator and the distress from the children, she slipped the harp’s strap over her shoulder, picked up the stool, and got to her feet. She hesitated; what she wanted to say could be used against the locals, but the Yaraka had so many other weapons, perhaps it wouldn’t matter. “If you keep that up, you’re going to have problems,” she said quietly. “It hurts them.”

The phora frowned at her. “Why do you say that? How do you know?” There was an edge to his voice. He didn’t like her or her comments; he’d had a sour look on his face and kept his distance from the moment he’d left the Director’s office. One of those who didn’t like outsiders.

“I can feel their pain,” she said quietly. “The tingler doesn’t bother the Cousins, it’s the others who show distress.”

“Feel!” He didn’t bother to conceal his disdain, turned his shoulder to her, and spoke to Aslan. “If you’ll go in now, Scholar. Quickly please. They’re treacherous little nothi.”

Smiling at the profound disapproval of the phora, Shadith followed Aslan in. The Goлs was clever enough to cover any problems he had with having them on planet and, unless there was a lot of complicated dancing involved here between him and the homeworld, he’d asked for them. The phora was too young (or perhaps too well connected) to bother hiding his annoyance. He had white tips to his ears and the white lines under his mask were broader than Koraka’s. From the data Aslan had passed around during the journey here, that meant he was a highborn cub, probably a second son doing his Mission-year before he settled down to one of the jobs created for his kind.

She glanced at Aslan. The Xenoeth had one of the Ridaar pickups pasted to her throat and was busily subvocalizing into it. It was the first time she’d seen Aslan at work and was surprised by the intensity of the woman, the sudden sharp focus which excluded everything except what she was observing.

The red-haired boy saw the harp and whistled something that Shadith almost caught. Along with one of the Others, he moved cautiously toward her.

He nodded at the harp, made a gesture of playing.

Shadith smiled. She dropped the stool, settled herself, contemplated him a moment, then drew her fingers across the strings. She played a lilting dance tune, brought to mind by the whistle talk since it had the same quick, sprightly movement.

The red-haired boy glanced from Shadith to Aslan. He grinned, pursed his lips in a whistle that was silent until he’d figured out intervals and tones, then he snapped his fingers and wove a sweet liquid line around her playing. His companion joined him.

The rest of the captives listened a moment longer, then they began whistling and dancing round and round the two women.

“Amazing.”

Shadith glanced around but kept her fingers busy.

The Goлs was talking to Aslan. She sighed and listened to them.

Aslan clicked off the Ridaar. “Oh?”

“How simple it is and how profound to bring a harpist to a world soaked in music.” He sighed. “The Yaraka are many things, but musical we’re not.”

“Credit your report, Goлs Koraka.”

“Do you have enough from this meeting? The sun is nearly down and I’d prefer to button up here before long.”

“I’ve enough to think about. There is one thing you might change. The harpist is also an empath; she says the tinglers cause real pain in the moss-children. If you could decrease the settings to minimum…”

Shadith played a last chord, stilled the strings, and looked up. “Let me try something, will you?”

The Goлs mobile ears went up as a Cousin might lift a brow, then he nodded. “As long as it doesn’t mean trouble. You understand me, I think.”

“It may prevent trouble.” She stood, shifted the harp, closed her eyes, and rubbed at her temple; her head was throbbing still from the Translator’s activity. When she looked up, the Bйluchar children were moving restlessly, getting ready to rush the gate. She thought a moment, then whistled a warning phrase. For the first time she heard ordinary speech from them, fragmentary whispers, but words nonetheless. The pain stabbed inward more strongly than ever. She ignored it, whistled again, a complex trill that said something like: wait, danger, help comes, wait, Maorgan comes.